Huawei P30 Lite Review; Right Balance of Value and Performance

6 min

At the end of March 2019, Huawei introduced its new P30 series which managed to stir up quite a buzz that has yet to die down owing to the P30 Pro’s amazing camera. At the same time, the company quietly introduced Huawei P30 Lite for its mid-range users which inherits many design elements from its elder siblings.

Huawei P30 Lite comes with some impressive specs and has been launched in the Pakistani market with the price tag of Rs. 47,999. Though one look is enough to fall in love with this device, let’s see if it can hold its end during our real-life testing.

Design

One of the highlights of Huawei P30 Lite is its design. When most smartphones in this price segment are offering plastic body, Huawei’s new offering comes with a premium glass build. It looks and feels like a flagship device where the slightly curved back helps to keep a firm grip on the smartphone.

Our review unit was the Midnight Black variant which looked quite beautiful and elegant. When you look at the back of the smartphone, you can see the triple camera setup placed at the top left corner while a traditional fingerprint sensor is present in the middle which is quite easy to reach with one’s fingers.

At the right side, we get a volume rocker and power key which thanks to their placement are not a hassle to reach and the user will be spared from stretching its thumb.

The SIM tray lies on the top of the smartphone and does not come with a dedicated microSD card slot.

Huawei P30 Lite is one good looking phone but due to its glass build, it is a fingerprint magnet and you will have to use a phone case to keep it clean and also protect it from scratches and cracks.

Display

Huawei P30 Lite comes with 6.15 inches of IPS LCD display with 1080 x 2312 pixels of screen resolution. It offers great display quality despite the absence of an OLED screen with deep blacks and vibrant colors. It also offers great viewing angles which make watching movies a riveting experience.

The phone’s display works just fine in direct sunlight so if you spend most of your time outdoors, you can crank up your phone’s brightness to full to clearly see your phone’s contents.

Software

Huawei P30 Lite runs on EMUI 9 based on Android Pie which apart from being user-friendly offers many useful features to its users.

User Interface

The user can opt for either gesture navigation, dock navigation or traditional navigation buttons for their smartphone. For more convenience, you also get the option to change the placement of navigation buttons through the phone’s settings.

Gesture navigation settings

To make your smartphone more secure, you can add a PIN lock or fingerprint sensor to access any specific app. You can also store your important documents, photos and videos inside File Safe, the device’s safe vault.

Huawei P30 Lite also offers a Private Space feature which creates a parallel dimension inside your phone which can be double down as a guest mode to keep intruders away from your private stuff.

Private Space

Interestingly, you can access this private space by using a different fingerprint than the one you regularly use to unlock your device which will take you directly there.

Performance

The smartphone is powered by Kirin 710 chipset coupled with 4GB RAM and 128GB of internal storage. Here are the benchmarks scores of the device:

During our extensive testing, we noticed that the smartphone worked flawlessly in moderate and light usage can perform all day to day operations without any problem.

The fact that Kirin 710 is an aging chipset is visible in heavy testing but owing to the presence of GPU Turbo technology 2.0 which is in charge of delivering better gaming experience and boosting up the phone’s performance while optimizing the phone’s battery.

Huawei P30 Lite runs almost all heavy games including Asphalt 9, PUBG, Deer Hunter and the Dead Trigger 2 but you can sometimes notice minor lags especially when you are switching from one resource intensive app to another. Despite this fact, the phone’s gaming performance never suffers.

The smartphone comes with a 3340mAh battery which sports a 9V fast charging feature. The phone’s battery was not too impressive as in our 1 hour of light usage which includes social media surfing, making calls, etc. the P30 Lite’s battery dropped by 16%.

Despite the presence of battery optimization by GPU Turbo technology 2.0, the smartphone consumed 22% battery in just 1 hour of heavy usage which comprised of gaming, video calling, and multitasking between apps. Moreover, during extended gaming sessions, the phone tends to get pretty hot which can be felt even with the protective case.

Camera

Huawei P30 Lite is yet another smartphone that is following the triple camera trend in 2019 and comes with a 24MP main sensor along with an 8MP ultra wide lens and a 2MP depth sensor at the back.

The phone comes with AI capabilities and can take some amazing shots in natural light. If you look at the pictures taken from Huawei P30 Lite, you will notice great color reproduction and subject details.

Auto Mode

Auto Mode

AI Mode

The images taken through AI mode have saturated colors which are great for social media. The AI mode enhances the colors of the image without making it seem artificial. The users can turn AI on or off via toggle located in the viewfinder.

The ultra wide lens also takes some amazing shots but in comparison with the primary camera, you can notice a little loss of details. The colors, however, look natural and well balanced.

Auto ModeUltra-Wide Angle

Auto ModeUltra Wide-Angle

Auto Mode6X Zoom

The HDR mode also works perfectly and only brightens the corners which require more exposure. If you are taking pictures in a backlit scenario, HDR mode can also light up the subject in the foreground.

In the Portrait mode, Huawei P30 Lite performs quite amicably and outlines the subject without any problem whereas the Aperture mode suffers in this area.

Huawei P30 Lite is not made for night time photography. You can see that the photo taken from auto mode is overexposed and there is a certain degree of shite shade present in the image. Though there is a dedicated night mode, it tends to increase the contrast which makes the image look artificial.

Auto Mode

AI modeHDR ModeNight ModeUltra-Wide AngleWide Aperture ModeAuto Mode

At the front of the smartphone, a 32MP camera for taking selfies resides inside the waterdrop notch.

The selfie camera at the front can take some amazing shots. It does not make the skin look artificially smooth which is quite a relief if you like taking somewhat natural selfies. It sometimes struggles with outlining the subject and blurring out the foreground.

Final Verdict

Huawei P30 Lite is a great mid-range device which offers premium design and an amazing display. Though the phone faces some stutters in heavy usage, which are negligible thanks to GPU Turbo technology, it performs amazingly in moderate use.

The camera takes some amazing shots in daylight but struggles to give the same performance during night time. The phone’s battery tends to drain pretty fast and the device tends to get hot during heavy usage which might put off many users.

It is a perfect device for people who are looking for a solid device and premium design. As for heavy users, they would have to keep their power banks closed especially if they spend most of their time outdoors and invest in some good phone case to protect their hands if the device heats up.